Chapter Text
Tifa is standing nearby the entrance doors of a fine dining restaurant in Sector 7 of Midgar City. With the long mirrors on these doors, she is checking out her reflection: golden brown dual eyeshadows are shimmering her lids, making the crimson colour of her eyes more striking than ever; the suppleness of her lips are tinted with a raspberry pink lipstick to maintain a degree of sweetness on her image; a pair of crystal earrings are dangling from her ears, and her hip length silky brown hair is elegantly styled to complement her entire look.
The longer that she stares at her reflection, the more she wonders if she is doing too much.
From inside her clutch bag, notifications about new text messages have shaken her phone with subtle vibrations. She takes it out and finds that the messages are from a guy who calls himself Fenrir0811 – the person she is expected to meet in a few minutes time.
Fenrir0811: I’m here. The only guy with a brown plaid suit.
Tifa is left with no more spare time to rethink the choices she has made for that evening. She inhales as deeply as her lungs can take and expels, hoping that the gusts of breath would carry with them the nervous bug in her system that’s causing her body to jitter.
She straightens out her backless sequin gold dress, ensuring that it sits neatly along her frame before making her entrance.
She saunters, tapping the heels of her glittering silver Valentine stilettos against the meteorite black marble floors, and runs her eyes through the scatter of tables full of sophisticatedly dressed guests. She is unaware that her presence attracts the attention of so many, if not all, in the vicinity, for her focus is only finding for Fenrir0811.
Somewhere at a table in the centre of the room, she finally found him – or at least the only guy with a brown plaid suit.
“Umm… Mr. Fenrir zero, eight, eleven… correct?” she greets him as she reaches the table.
He lifts his head up and looks at her with eyes as blue as the ocean under a warm summer sky. “Ah yes, that’s me.” His demeanour is a little awkward, a far contrast from his rather dashing appearance. “And you are… Ms. Anxious heart?”
She realizes how ridiculous her username sounds, now that he is saying it!
“Uhh… yeah, that’s me,” she says, embarrassed. “Do you mind?” she asks, pointing at the chair across him.
“Oh!” He rises up from his seat and hastens to pull the chair she is referring to out from underneath the table. “Please… take a seat.”
It is not exactly what she has in mind… in fact, she feels bad about making him get up to do her a favour. But then again, if she apologizes, she suspects the guy will apologize too in return and it will be a never-ending cycle of apologies between them. So she accepts his offer, sits down and thanks him instead.
She is now facing him in an uncomfortable hush as they await the arrival of a waiter or a waitress. The stiffness of his body tells her that he is as nervous and painfully shy as she is. He seems lost, almost out of place and she recognizes that if this continues, the night will end unfavourably for the both of them.
“Why… did you choose Fenrir as your username?” she asks, a random question that pops into her mind for the sake of breaking the ice.
Her question seems to relax the tenseness around his shoulders a little. “Fenrir is a mythical creature that takes the form of a giant wolf,” he answers, drawing her heed to a wolf head earring on his right ear. “And I guess I really like wolves.”
“That’s fascinating,” she remarks, curious now to learn more about what else a guy who puts so much thought in creating his online persona has in store. “I made mine with less creativity.”
Her words pique his interest, “Why’s yours ‘anxious heart’?” His eyes are set on her like a jury picking apart pieces of evidence presented to him.
“I worry too much sometimes,” she admits, choosing to be transparent about one of her character’s many imperfections.
He crafts a smile on his lips, almost as though he is glad to hear her admission. “You and me… the same,” he says, to her delight.
The smile stays on his face for quite a while, leading her to believe that the first wall between them has been overcome. It is time to ram against the next wall.
“My real name’s Tifa Lockhart,” she introduces herself with a hand on her chest. “What’s yours?”
“Cloud Strife.” A name that suits those beautiful eyes, she thinks.
An apologetic waiter eventually arrives at their table with two booklets of menus. As they peruse through a long list of à la carte dishes, the waiter pours them two glasses of water. It does not take Tifa much thinking to decide what she wants to have for dinner. There is only one dish that appeals to her the most and she wants to read its name for the waiter.
Cloud beats her to it, “One chocobo tenderloin, please.”
“Make that two, please!” she adds, to which the waiter enters in his touchscreen tablet. She widens her eyes at Cloud, “I swear I’m not copying you.”
He chuckles, the corners of his eyes crinkling, “We share the same tastes then.” When he lays his eyes on her, there is a hint of smile, “Shall we have a bottle of Mooglinart Rosé?”
“Yes please,” she blushes. They have read each other’s minds again.
The waiter bows and leaves them to patiently wait for their food in each other’s company. It gives Tifa the chance to sort out her mind to keep their interactions going.
“Why… me?” she hesitantly asks while staring at him to gauge his reaction. It is a question which has lingered in her mind since he asked her out for a blind date. Out of all the usernames and profile details in the instant messaging platform they are using, she really thinks hers is one of the most ordinary ones; she is just not good in coming up with witty captions to captivate her online audience.
His relaxed face quickly switches into one mired with trouble. “Do you… really want to know why?”
“I do,” she asserts, feigning composure. It cannot be that bad, right? Unless… he has some sort of a disturbing fetish or motive. She silently prays that he does not have one.
He looks away, avoiding her eyes. “There’s no… particular reason.” Tension returns to the language around his body as guilt leads him to retreat back into his shell. “My… friend insisted that I go out on a date and your username just happened to be the first one I’d taken notice of.”
For Tifa, the revelation comes as a shock – a good kind of shock. “Oh Gaia!” she covers her face with her hands as shame flares her cheeks. “We really are no different!”
“Huh?” His eyes dart to her with speed. “What do you mean?”
She refuses to remove her hands, “I also didn’t think twice about agreeing to this date because my friend insisted that I find someone to go out with.” She sighs, “It didn’t matter if it’s you or anyone else.” She quietly spits a curse on herself for being too honest with him.
He does not offer her any reply, leaving them both in a silent limbo that compels her to move her hands away and gaze at him with eyes full of regret. But then the air clears and she oddly finds humour in their positions – and so does he. They let out snorts, which rapidly shift into a series of cackles that turn heads.
“Well, at least things are going fine between us now,” he states, sniffing tears of amusement away.
And she agrees. It was a reckless decision on her part, one that she thought she would regret for the rest of her life. But their meeting has been pleasant enough for her to think that it has gone otherwise.
***
The clock on a tall watchtower displays a time that reads ten minutes to midnight. But Midgar is a city that never sleeps. Vehicles continue to crowd mazes of grey winding roads; shopping centres are still open for late night frequenters; bars and clubs roar with booming music and flashing strobe lights to make people dance, and people still wander in the streets to socialize, ignoring the approaching of another working day.
Tifa and her companion, Cloud are making their way out of the fine dining restaurant, laughing about a childish joke that has recently circulated online. In the past five hours that they spent together, she learned so much about him – where he lives, that he is an only child like her, his favourite food and films, his favourite café – and no matter how much information he has supplied to her, her curiosity about him never ceases.
And he returns the same level of interest.
They pass by a makeshift stall hidden somewhere in an alley and Cloud points to it, “Their squid jerkies are the best, by the way.”
“What the hell…” she turns her head to him, “That’s what I was going to say!”
They laugh again. It’s all they have done throughout the night. There is always something to laugh about, mostly over just how similar they are in their thoughts.
They are nearing the intersection that will lead to her home and Tifa slows down her pace. She does not want the night to end. What if they never see each other again? A needless musing, considering that they live in the same city and they practically know where one and the other live. But what if he wants this to end here?
Something stops her walk… a huge brightly lit billboard towering above her neighbourhood. It is an advertisement for a newly released Hewley sneakers. The model stands against a wall, legs positioned in a way that centres his footwear and a sultriness on his face that pulls people to pay attention.
The model is Cloud.
“Uhh… so are you going to tell me that you model for a living or not?”
Cloud stops by her side and looks up to see himself on the billboard. “I figured you’ll find out soon enough…” There is more disappointment than pride on his face. “I look like a mess in that.”
She frowns, “What are you saying?” She takes a glance at the billboard, “You look great! You almost have me convinced that I want those Hewley sneakers.”
“Thanks Tifa…” he smiles, but his eyes remain dull with uncertainty.
There is more to him than he lets on. She just hopes that he will give her the opportunity to find out.
“Okay… I think it’s time for us to part our ways,” she tells, leaving questions about their next meeting in the air for him to clear.
As if he senses her foot-dragging, his smile alters into one with more genuineness as he suggests, “Tifa, let’s meet again.”
Her heart makes a leap of excitement which she tries her best to contain. “Yeah, that would be great.”
She waves him goodbye and makes her way back home. They have not set the time and date for their next meeting but she is certain that it is coming.